MSU business expert: Southwest will have to 'give away a lot of free stuff, and really apologize, apologize, apologize'

It's been a days-long headache for Southwest Airlines travelers Susan and Rick Biegler, who decided to visit family in Colorado for the holidays.

"They're all having trouble but Southwest is the worst," Susan Biegler said. "He actually passed out this morning in the airport, and they made us go by ambulance to the hospital, to have him checked out and get an OK, and come back and we thought we'd get on the next plane."

Now the couple is renting a car to make it back home to Las Vegas because the airline hasn't been able to guarantee them a flight.

"At least we know we'll get back, we've been trying to get back for three days," Rich Biegler told CBS News Colorado. 

Tuesday brought dropping stocks for the company, and thousands more flight cancellations. Nearly five days after the problems started, Southwest Airlines CEO Bob Jordan finally issued an apology, in a 2-minute video posted on the company's website. 

"Please also hear that I am truly sorry," Jordan said. "And after days of trying to operate as much of our full schedule across the busy holiday weekend, we reached a decision point to significantly reduce our flying to catch up. We're focused on safely getting all of the pieces back into position to end this rolling struggle."

"You know, I have nothing but pride and respect for the efforts of the people of Southwest who are showing up in every way," he continued. "The tools we use to recover from disruption serve us well, 99% of the time; but clearly, we need to double down on our already existing plans to upgrade systems for these extreme circumstances so that we never again face what's happening right now."

But will the airline be able to jump back from all of this?

"This is definitely what you call a come to Jesus moment," said Darrin Duber-Smith, an MSU Denver business professor. "I don't know what condition they're in, but they're a relatively healthy airline, compared to other airlines. I think they have a better brand reputation than most, so I think they're starting from a better position than maybe winning their customers back."

But Duber-Smith said it's going to cost Southwest and it needs to do damage control, by being honest with the public about what happened and compensating travelers.

"Southwest is going to have to navigate this," said Duber-Smith. "It's not going to be good for their brand, and they are just going to have to give away a lot of free stuff, and really apologize, apologize, apologize, apologize, and just make sure it doesn't happen again."